COME! if thy heart be pure, thy spirits calm, If thou hast no dark memories, or but those Pure self- reproach inflicts-ah no, bestows; Her wounds, here probed, find here their gentlest balm. O the sweet sadness of that lifted palm! The dreadful Deed to come His lips disclose: Yet love and awe, not wrath, that count'nance shows, As though they sang even now that ritual psalm Which closed the Feast piacular. Time hath done His work on this fair picture; but that Face His outrage awes. Stranger! the mist of years, Between thee hung and half its heavenly grace, Hangs there, a fitting veil; nor that alone They see it best who see it through their tears! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE TENT ON THE BEACH: 3. THE GRAVE BY THE LAKE by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER PENITENTIAL PSALM: 130. DE PROFUNDIS by THOMAS WYATT LITTLE BERNHARD by JOHANNA AMBROSIUS ASTROPHEL'S SONG OF PHILLIDA AND CORYDON by NICHOLAS BRETON PROVERBS IN RHYME by ALICE CARY NATIVE SWORDS; A VOLUNTEER SONG, JULY 1, 1792 by THOMAS OSBORNE DAVIS |